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ALBUM REVIEW

Sleep Steady

TRUNK

Released April 2017

The young Tacoma hip-hop scene is on fire. Roughly once a month, in a secret location with a list of secret artists, there’s Toe Jam: A series of cathartic, hip-hop raves, held in sweaty basements, as raucous celebrations of musical debauchery. That context is useful for understanding the epic, grinding rap-synth-punk sound of Sleep Steady and this 2017 album, TRUNK. Like the gaudy and in-your-face cover art–reminiscent of Kanye’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy cover by George Condo–this record balances messy, raw emotion with sweetness, and then hits you in the gut. Put on the first track, “HABITS,” and let the strident synths overtake you. Beneath all that digital distortion is music screaming for an intimate, close connection. This is anti-algorithm music that, as someone commented on Bandcamp, “goes way hard.”